The present invention relates in general to product marketing, product selection, and product catalog entry customization relating to the sale of veterinary pharmaceuticals and other animal-related products, and in particular the present invention relates to a computer-enabled, integrated, e-commerce method and system for facilitating the dynamic building and providing of a customized catalog of available products and related information to veterinarians relating to the sale of veterinary pharmaceuticals and other animal-related products.
FIG. 1 illustrates the traditional and often repeated scenario of an animal owner that has brought an animal, such as a pet, to a veterinarian at an animal hospital, including any animal treatment facility or location where a licensed veterinarian is authorized to do business, for treatment of a condition as shown at 10 to respond to illness of the animal or improve the animal's health. Once the veterinarian has examined the animal, and based on observations and medical experience, the veterinarian communicates a verbal treatment plan as shown at 12 and issues a written prescription to the owner as shown at 14. FIG. 1 also illustrates that compliance to fulfill the script at 16 and to administer treatment to the animal at 20 in accordance with the treatment plan has been almost exclusively dependent upon the animal owner.
However, this traditional method of treating animals with animal-related products has been subject to the primary shortfall of non-compliance of administering the recommended treatment to the animal as illustrated at 26, 28. Largely, such noncompliance has resulted from inherent delay and the inconvenience placed upon the owner to return to the veterinarian to renew prescriptions, to hand-carry prescriptions to the local pharmacy, wait to have them filled, and to remember to administer the treatment as prescribed to the animal according to the treatment plan. Thus, non-compliance may include any deviation from the treatment plan of the veterinarian, such as an owner's failure to renew the prescription, failure to refill the prescription and do so in a timely manner as shown at 22, or failure to administer the treatment and do so in a timely manner according to the treatment plan as shown at 26, 28. Since the animal has been mostly unable to indicate need for treatment, compliance has been left primarily to the owner in this traditional scenario, and diminished compliance has resulted.
In the case of treatments that have involved the administration of multiple doses of medicine or supplement on a periodic basis, for example weekly, in the past the owner has had the option of purchasing an initial quantity of medication or supplement sufficient for the entire anticipated treatment period, to be administered in multiple subsequent periodic installments at the sole remembering and initiative of the animal owner. Or, in the case of ongoing treatments over time, the animal owner might have been required in the past to return to the veterinary pharmacy for filling of subsequent installments of treatments prior to the owner's having administered such subsequent treatment to the animal. But as shown at 22 and 26, neither the return to the pharmacy, and as a result, nor the administration of the treatment occurred, illustrating noncompliance with the treatment plan.
It is distressing that there has been a very low compliance rate in the administration of pharmaceuticals to animals, documented as between 34-48 percent among customers of veterinary preventative medications, and 19% for therapeutic diets, as published in the 2003 AAHA study, The Path to High-Quality Care: Practical Tips for Improving Compliance. 
Traditionally, pharmacy's within veterinary hospitals, and especially those within smaller animal treatment facilities or locations where only one or just a few licensed veterinarians have been authorized to do business, have struggled to profitably and effectively manage and dispense veterinary pharmaceuticals and animal supplements. This has been in part due to the lack of a system for effectively integrating animal pharmacies and animal care providers such as veterinarians and veterinary hospitals.
Since there is currently a very large number of supplement and pharmaceutical treatment options available for animals presenting a wide variety of disorders and conditions, it has been very difficult, if not impossible, for a veterinarian, or a small veterinary hospital, to have maintained in stock sufficient quantities of each of the many and varied medications available, without such supplies becoming stale, losing potency, or expiring. Further, the management of such inventory, even if possible, would be very cumbersome, labor intensive, and expensive. Since there is such a wide variety of pharmaceutical, over-the-counter and supplement treatment options for animals today, it has been very difficult for an in-hospital pharmacy to stay current on and keep all of the many products available in fresh supply. This problem has been exacerbated by the fact that, with some medications or products the number of animals for which the product may have been beneficially prescribed has been relatively small.
From an animal pharmacy's perspective, it has been difficult to integrate many disparate providers of animal care services with a standard product offering that is effectively managed, given the many different products available and the fact that the product list and pricing is constantly changing. Such difficulty has further acted to prevent involvement of individual veterinarians and animal hospitals in transactions involving the sale of veterinary pharmaceuticals and other animal-related products, since pharmacies have had only less effective means of marketing to and creating relationships with animal care providers. For example, prior methods of marketing animal pharmaceutical products to veterinarians has involved a system of advance sheets and traditional marketing literature provided to veterinarians and hospitals by drug manufacturers, together with drug sales representatives who have called on the veterinarians and hospitals.
Accordingly, it has been a challenge for veterinary hospitals and veterinarians to participate successfully in, and profit from the sale of, pharmaceutical and other animal-related products for treatment of animals seen at the veterinary hospital. And this, in turn, has negatively impacted the treatment of animals, since already low rates of compliance with veterinary treatment regimens overall are worsened where the veterinarian is not effectively involved, financially or otherwise, in the pharmaceutical and supplement dispensing and supplying process. This situation is complicated in the case of treatments that have involved the administration of multiple doses of medicine or supplement on a periodic basis, for example weekly, or daily for a period of time.
Prior non-computerized methods and systems of enabling, controlling and managing the processing, fulfilling, dispensing and handling of sales of animal-related products have not included a customizable, automated means of product offering, selection, billing, accounting and proceeds sharing capability to enable veterinarians and animal hospitals to effectively participate and profit from the sale directly to customers of the increasingly larger varieties of products available. As such, traditional prior art methods and systems of dispensing veterinary pharmaceuticals have not employed effective means for veterinarians and their staff to participate in the product sale transaction and thus more positively impact compliance of the animal owner in using the prescribed medication or supplement to support more effective treatment outcomes. Thus, in addition to the need for an effective and automated method of enabling customized product marketing, offerings and selection, as well as controlling sales and distribution of animal-related products, there has been needed an effective and automated method to include animal hospitals and veterinarians in the distribution of proceeds from sales of such products.
Prior attempts to address the basic limitations of manual ordering, fulfillment and dispensing of animal product systems, as with a typically customer-centric, centralized pharmacy accessible by the customer, or alternatively by the veterinarian, by telephone or the Internet, have not adequately involved the animal hospital, or veterinarian, in the process, either from a dispensing follow-up standpoint or from a financial standpoint. Thus, while such systems have enabled improvements, allowing greater ease for the animal owner to access the pharmacy via telephone or Internet, and hence there has been slightly less likelihood of delay in fulfilling prescriptions, these systems have not effectively incentivized participation of the animal hospital and thus have not adequately accounted for beneficial participation by the animal hospital in the transaction. And this ultimately has negatively impacted compliance with animal treatment plans.
Further, though with previously described methods and systems, sometimes a veterinarian has been able to call in, fax in, or email in a prescription directly to the central pharmacy for manual pickup by the customer, such solutions have lacked a coherent strategy and computerized system for marketing and offering both pharmaceutical and other animal-related products for selection by the animal care provider. Such a system is needed that is customizable by and for each animal care provider and that ultimately enables the animal care provider to benefit from its efforts and be involved in this aspect of the ongoing treatment of the animal.
Such prior art telephone or Internet enabled systems have not been well designed to account for the fact that, in order for a veterinarian to issue a prescription, he or she must first see the animal for which the treatment plan is issued. Therefore, while the telephone or Internet enabled model of distributing veterinary pharmaceuticals has facilitated the distribution of medicines, it still has lacked a viable method for involvement of the veterinary hospital in the offering and selection of products and ultimately the creation of effective animal treatment plans by a veterinarian that is intimately familiar with the animal. Of course, with such prior art systems a veterinarian could call or fax a remote central pharmacy and place a medication order, based on a relatively incomplete system of advance sheets received by the hospital from drug manufacturers, and that order could be shipped to the customer directly by the central pharmacy, but this method has required additional steps for the veterinarian to send the prescription to a remote pharmacy and has lacked a comprehensive system for facilitating customizable product selection by the hospital and individual prescribing veterinarians. Such a system has been needed while managing and facilitating the process and relationship between the hospital and the pharmacy, all while fostering an economic incentive for the veterinarian and hospital to use a particular pharmacy.
In fact, such prior art systems may have introduced a disincentive for better hospital and pharmacy relationships, because once the customer has been introduced to the pharmacy with such prior art, centralized telephone and Internet pharmacy methods, the pharmacy may have developed, and frequently has developed, a direct relationship with the animal owner, selling additional products and services directly to the owner with no supervision and no economic benefit to the veterinarian. Thus, such systems have done little to improve the compliance of administering pharmaceuticals and supplements in accordance with a veterinarian-prescribed treatment plan, since in such case follow through with treatment has still been left almost exclusively to the animal owner.
While the foregoing clearinghouse-type centralized pharmacy solutions have sought to address the inability of veterinarians to effectively and profitably participate in long term treatment plans of animals, as described above, the solutions have entailed other problems, have not provided a comprehensive, yet customizable, means of presenting products for selection by a veterinarian, have not addressed compliance issues as described, and have not adequately involved the veterinarian in the process or transaction, financially or otherwise, sufficient to ensure the high-quality treatment that owners expect for their pets and other animals.